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- BY 


JAMES W, ALEXANDER, D. D. 


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“Let patience have her perfect work.”—James i. 4 


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PHILADELPHIA: 


PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 
No. 265 CHESTNUT STREET. 





Entered according to the Act of Congress in the year 1852, by 
ALEXANDER W. Mirtcueuu, M.D. 


In the office of the Clerk of the District Court for the 


Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 


ADVERTISEMENT. 


Tue following meditations on Patience, 
though once delivered in substance to a 
Christian assembly, were written as a pas- 
toral gift to an esteemed friend, who had 
been more than two years confined to her 
dwelling by a dangerous, lingering, and 
sometimes exceedingly painful malady. May 
the good Lord carry his truth with a bless- 


ing to other chambers of trial! 


(3) 





ep 
ipt 


ea sty 


helwan “ome 
¥ ; Hobe | ; 
os 


FALIENCE, 


Some words which are often in our 
mouths are, nevertheless, but little un- 
derstood ; and some virtues which we 
are continually praising, are hardly 
ever put in practice. This is as true of 
patience as of any thing else. Every 
man needs it, every man knows he 
would be the better for it, yet every 
man falls short of it. This, I suppose, 
was one reason why the apostle James 
teaches so emphatically concerning it, 


“Let patience have her perfect work.” James i. 4. 

It would seem that the “twelve 
tribes scattered abroad,’ to whom this 
apostle wrote, were in trials and need- 
ed comfort. For the very first words 


1™ (5) 


6 PATIENCE. 


of his letter are as if he stood over 
them and said, Be of good cheer! 
“ My brethren,” says he, “count it all 
joy, when ye fall into divers tempta- 
tions,” 2%. ¢., trials. These troubles 
tried their faith (v. 5,) and “ untried 
faith is uncertain faith.” The result 
of these trials of faith is patience. 
The very word is derived from “ suf- 
fering,”* and if there were no pain 
there could be no patience. If then 
patience is good, trials are good. And 
the great caution to be observed under 
such dispensations is, that we lose 
not the fulness of the benefit; that we 
content not ourselves with half the 
mercy; that we stop not short of the 
entire grace; for we may suffer and 
yet not profit; therefore, says the in- 
spired teacher, ‘“‘ Let patience have 
her perfect work.” 


*TIn Latin patientia, from patior. 


PATIENCE. ? 


I. Patience is a certain temper of 
mind under suffering. As we all are 
appointed to suffer, and some of us 
to suffer greatly and suffer long, we 
should do well to learn more of this 
heavenly art, concerning which so 
much good is spoken in Scripture. 

In its simplest form, patience is a 
calm and unshaken state of mind, 
strongly bearing up against a present 
burden of distress. This may exist 
without religion. A Stoic or a west- 
ern savage may endure pain without 
a murmur. Malefactors have stoutly 
faced the torments of their penal death. 
In respect to this, the natural tempera- 
ment of human beings differs. Some 
can naturally bear more than others. 
They have more rigid fibre, or less 
shrinking nerves, more robust health, 
or smaller sensibility. The degree of 
pain is to be measured, not by the 


8 PATIENCE. 


force of the blow, but the power of 
resistance. That which would crush 
a reed shall leave no mark upon an 
oak. When pain comes, however, it 
is well if we have even natural means 
of enduring it. But practice, disci- 
pline, and exercise add vastly even to 
this natural fortitude. Fresh soldiers 
and new recruits quail and fly, but the 
veteran has looked death in the face. 
He who has endured once, can en- 
dure again. Still more efficacious is 
the operation of inward principle, add- 
ing moral motives to the barely natural 
power. Education has this for part of 
its work, to teach the young to bear 
some burdens, not to fall back at every 
alarm, nor cry out at every pang. 
Stern determination will help one to 
sustain what might at first have seemed 
intolerable. This is remarkably the 
case in great and sudden pangs of an- 


PATIENCE. 9 


guish, for which a resolved mind has 
prepared itself. 

Though pains of mind are worse than 
pains of body, they also may be en- 
dured by some with hardihood and 
tranquillity, and this we call fortitude, 
and in some circumstances patience. 
By great skill and self-control in man- 
aging the thoughts and detaching the 
attention from distressing objects, some 
are able, to a degree which at first 
might seem impracticable, to keep up 
quietude, self-possession, and even a 
show of cheerfulness, under complicated 
bereavements, mortifications, and griefs. | 
All this may enter into the Christian’s 
patience; but all this falls infinitely 
short of its “ perfect work.” 

Christian patience adds to this a 
sweet, childlike resignation to God’s 
holy will, in the affliction, whatever it 
may be. All merely natural or phi- 


10 PATIENCE. 


losophical patience is cold, gloomy, 
sullen, and unprofitable. Though it 
may refrain from tears, it cannot smile; 
for it hath no faith, no love, no Sa- 
viour, no covenant, no God! Chris- 
tian patience “endures, as seeing Him 
who is invisible ;” that is faith. Heb. 
xi. 1. It looks up to the rod in the 
hand of a chastening Father. Heb. 
xii. 6. It considers One that endured 
such contradiction against himself, and 
arms itself with the same mind. 1 Pet. 
iv. 1. It beholds every pang disposed 
according to a covenant transaction. 
1 Cor. ii. 22, 23. And it bows to 
all, however distressing, as ordered by 
the infinite wisdom, justice, and good- 
ness. Lam. 11. 37—40. Therefore it 
is, that the stoutest and hardest of 
worldly sufferers falls so far below the 
feeblest of Christ’s lambs, when laid 
under heavy trials. Though pangs of 


PATIENCE. 1l 


anguish must now and then extort a 
sigh, tear, or groan, the child of God 
still turns to him, when smitten, and 
kisses the paternal hand. It is again 
Jaith, believing that God doth it, and 
that all he doth is wisest and is best. 
It is submission, yielding the neck to 
the yoke (Lam. iii. 27), bowing down 
under the Omnipotent hand, (1 Pet. 
v. 6), and prostrating itself beneath 
the infinite and eternal will, (Gen. 
xvii. 25.) It is resignation, giving 
the whole matter into the best hands, 
that He may undertake, (Isa. xxxvill. 
14), and undoubtingly referring every 
future event unto the God of the lilies 
and the birds. Matt. vi. 26. It is 
humility, owning itself little, and de- 
pendent, and mean, and unworthy, 
and therefore willing to suffer. And 
it 1s penitence, bewailing sin, pleading 
for mercy, wondering that it suffers so 


12 PATIENCE. 


little, and remembering how light are 
these pains compared with the agonies 
of the lost, or the vicarious sorrows of 
the Lord our righteousness. All this, 
and much more, is present In every case 
of truly sanctified Christian affliction; 
and this sheds a light through the cur- 
tains of evangelical sorrow, which is al- 
together unknown to the most resolute 
of stoical heroes. 

There is a third consideration, not 
to be omitted in our study of Christian 
patience. The word, as said above, 
implies suffering and endurance, but it 
includes another idea. It has reference 
to time. It is not barely willingness to 
suffer, but willingness to suffer more. 
Nature would not wait a moment; it 
would be delivered now. Grace leaves 
all to God, and says, “* My times are in 
his hand!” Though the succour tarry, 
patience can wait. Hab. ii. 38. What 


PATIENCE, BM 


grace is this, thus added to faith and 
love? Is it not Hope, the sister grace, — 
that abideth? 1 Cor. xin. 13. Lean- 
ing on her anchor, hope looks out from 
her post of observation, casting the 
eye over a waste of billows, and sweep- 
ing that dim horizon where as yet no 
sail twinkles along the distant line that 
unites the sea and sky, but sure that 
though weeping may endure for a 
night, joy cometh in the morning. Psa. 
xxx. 0. He that hath been with her 
in six troubles, in the seventh will not 
forsake her. Job v. 19. Here is a 
blessed pillow for the languid aching 
head, a cool refreshment for the throb- 
bing temple. Here is a secret cordial 
which has enabled many a child of sor- 
row to bear the heavy load; when 
tribulation worketh patience. Rom. v. 3. 
This hope is more than empty conjec- 
ture or vague expectation. It is firm; 


2 


14 PATIENCE. 


it is fixed. Its hold is above. It 
seizes on words of promise and of cove- 
nant. It is sustaining itself by the 
arm of the mighty Saviour. Its spirit- 
ual cable grapples that which is within 
the veil (Heb. vi. 19), and hence it 
maketh not ashamed. Rom. v. 5. 

If it were God’s way to send on 
his children only such trials as are 
pungent, quick, and brief, however 
severe, the test of patience would 
be incomplete; but sometimes his rod 
lies long, and the soul is made to 
ery out, ‘“ Thine arrows stick fast in 
me, and thy hand presseth me sore!” 
Psa. xxxvill. 2. “ How long wilt thou 
forget me, O Lord?” Psa. xii. 1. The 
very working of the remedy depends 
on this withholding of immediate cure. 
Yet the believing child learns to think 
and feel that God’s time is best, and is 
assured that “ He doth not afflict will- 


PATIENCE. 15 


ingly, nor grieve the children of men.” 
Lam. i. 33. And hope opens the 
window, and even though no dry land 
as yet appears, welcomes the olive- 
branch borne by the dove of promise. 
Gen. vii. 10, 11. Deep may call unto 
deep. Psa. xlu. 7. “ Yet the Lord will 
command his loving-kindness in the 
day-time, and in the night his song 
shall be with me, and my prayer unto 
the God of my life.” (verse 8.) “My 
soul, wait thou only upon God!” Psa. 
Ix. 5. Thus she cheers the night- 
watches, and in the multitude of her 
thoughts within her, God’s comforts 
delight her soul. Psa. xciv. 19. The 
experience of the psalmist is made for 
such times of languishing. Many a 
solitary one has renewed the strain of 
David's pensive chord, and sung with 
plaintive note, “I am shut up, and I 
cannot come forth. Mine eye mourn- 


16 PATIENCE. 


eth by reason of affliction. Lord, I 
have called daily upon thee, I have 
stretched out my hands unto thee.” 
Psa. Ixxxvui. 8,9. The night wears 
heavily away ; the stars in their courses 
shine dimly; no streak of eastern dawn- 
ing betokens day. Yet the hopeful 
sufferer can say, “I wait for the Lord, 
my soul doth wait, and in his word do 
I hope; my soul waiteth for the Lord, 
more than they that watch for the 
morning; I say, more than they that 
watch for the morning.” Psa. cxxx. 
5, 6. And patience, not worn out 
with waiting, turns on its pillow, and 
breathes itself to God, saying, “ My 
soul is even as a weaned child.” 
Psa. @XXX1..2; 

It would not be difficult to fill up the 
whole tract with an account of those 
different circumstances of a human 
creature in which he must exercise 


PATIENCE. 17 


this Christian virtue. But those to 
whom such details would be applicable 
are the very persons who need no 
prompter; they know what their dis- 
tresses are. It is much more import- 
ant to observe, that there is no kind or 
degree of suffering which our Heavenly 
Father ordains, under which we may 
not exercise patience, and, therefore, 
as every human being is born to suffer, 
there is not a single reader to whom 
this lesson is not important, however 
much he may think the contrary, in the 
pride and self-sufficiency of youth, or 
health, or fortune, or good spirits. And 
though certain persons in our fastidious 
generation grow intensely weary, when 
time is bestowed in sustaining and com- 
forting the broken-hearted—let such 
know, that their time is coming, and 
that even if now they have their “good 
things,” and think their “mountain 


as 


18 PATIENCE. 


stands strong,” they shall yet live to 
behold the day in which they must 
have a stock and habit, yea a grace of 
patience, or sink into extreme despond- 
ency, if not despair. 

In one view the suffering life of 
many Christians, and those the best, is 
hard to understand, for it seems at war 
not only with God’s fatherly goodness, 
but with his gracious covenant. (Read 
Jer. xu. 12, and Psa. lxxii.) But we 
must never lose our hold of two cardinal 
pillars, the very Jachin and Boaz of 
our temple: (1) that happiness in this 
world is not the chief good; the affirm- 
ing of which is the radical error of all 
the common public economy, and much 
of the philanthropy of the day; and (2) 
that the education, or discipline, or 
training, or perfecting of a soul is so 
great and divine a work, that it is 
worth a lifetime of distress; so that no 


PATIENCE. 19 


redeemed saint will look back on the 
longest sufferings of the present life as 
more than the scarcely perceptible mo- 
ment before an eternity of holy delight. 
Angels look down and see poor sin- 
wounded creatures fighting against 
their chief medicine. As has been 
said, God does not afflict nor grieve the 
children of men “willingly,” arbitra- 
rily, out of any love to see them suffer, 
or any indifference to their sorrows; 
but with a wise and definite end, which 
will be revealed hereafter. The entire 
process of Christian endurance, pain- 
bearing, or patience, from beginning to 
end, in all its connection of parts, is 
more deeply interesting to one who 
could read it, than any drama ever 
enacted on the stage. So it will one 
day appear, when not only the parti- 
cular sufferer, but all the company of 
God’s elect in heaven, shall look back 


20 PATIENCE, 


and see many a mystery of providence 
resolved. They will rise to higher ad- 
miration of the divine plan, when they 
shall be instructed why Joseph had his 
youth oppressed by cruelty, exile and 
imprisonment; why David was a per- 
secuted fugitive, and a bereaved father ; 
why the apostles were as sheep ap- 
pointed to the slaughter; why the early 
Christians were mowed down by the 
sword; and why to this day they that 
will live godly suffer persecution. They 
will recall ten thousand cases, (for eter- 
nity has neither limits nor weariness,) 
in which some of the best of men have 
lain under pangs, or in languishing 
from sore diseases; or journeyed 
through a valley of gloom and de- 
pression; or been marks for arrows 
from the bow of wicked fellow-creatures, 
and more malignant demons; and why 
others, with hearts sickened by hope 


Cea 


PATIENCE. 21 


deferred, waited years and almost life- 
times without seeing the accomplish- 
ment of their strongest desires. When 
these several circles are complete, and 
every covering removed, and God’s 
light thrown on dark places of the spi- 
ritual temple, it will appear, that this 
very divine product, to wit, holy pa- 
tience, has been as dear to the great 
Architect of the Church, as is the cost- 
liest sculpture to the most devoted 
enthusiast in art. And therefore we 
are exhorted not merely to have pa- 
tience, but to let patience have her 
perfect work. 

Il. The perfect work of patience is 
plainly nothing less than the full and 
thorough carrying out of patience, with 
unfaltering strength of soul, in every 
kind and measure of trial, unto the very 
end. Death closes all trials of the be- 
lever; but until death he is to have 


A PATIENCE. 


his armour on. There may be some 
reality of true Christian patience, and 
yet it may be very weak. We must 
learn to bear up bravely, and with the 
putting forth of a complete manful en- 
ergy. Small encounters are useful to 
the raw recruit; they exercise him in 
the virtues which in process of time 
make him a soldier. He that bearded 
the lion and bear, afterwards accepted 
the challenge of Goliath, though still a 
ruddy youth. Could we look on daily 
troubles, as exercises set us by the 
Master, to fit us for the higher efforts 
of patience, we should be saved much 
repining and many groans. The great 
duty is always the duty of the day, of 
the hour, of this moment. If our 
equanimity is destroyed by the trifles 
of a life generally prosperous—what 
can we expect of ourselves, in the 
water-floods of tribulation which may 


PATIENCE. 23 


yet rollin? Jer. xii. 5. Let us learn 
to bear with a hard hand on the helm, 
before the tempest arises. Under the 
sense of God’s supreme governance and 
paternal love, and in expectation of 
reward and rest hereafter, let us bow 
ourselves to the sovereign disposal; 
bearing all that God sends, and Christ 
our Mediator concurs in, with a yield- 
ing, filial, believing soul. 

Patience may be said to have its per- 
fect work, when it withstands a great, 
sudden and extraordinary affliction 
without being shaken. Uncommon 
faith is necessary for such an exercise 
as this. Indeed who has not cause to 
join in the prayer, Lead us not into 
temptation! Strong Christians are the 
persons to whom this forefront of the 
battle is reserved; to them “it is gwen 
in the behalf of Christ, not only to be- 
lieve on him, but also to suffer for his 


24 PATIENCE. 


sake.” Phil. i. 29. Itis Job, the “ per- 
fect man,” who is carried through the 
unexampled conflict. And the early 
believers to whom James addressed the 
words of the text, were exposed to evils 
such as happily we know nothing of. 
Yet they needed the exhortation. 
Patience has its perfect work, when 
it does not give way but holds out, 
however long may be the trial. Even 
weakness may sustain a momentary 
attack, and pungent anguish may be 
borne, if it be soon over. But to have 
day after day of pain, and night after 
night of fearful watching; to le down 
heavy, yet hoping for no alleviation in 
the morning; to be wounded again and 
again, and find increasing years bring 
new losses and deeper sorrows ;—this 
has been the lot of some who were 
God’s children, and concerning whom 
it might well be said, that though the 


PATIENCE. 2a 


outer man perished, the inner man was 
renewed day by day. No man can 
number the cases of hopeless disease, 
tending incurably to certain and pain- 
ful death, which occur in every age, 
and that among true believers. Christ’s 
confessors have, in more periods of the 
church than one, spent large parts of 
their best years in prison. Millions 
have borne all the complicated ills of 
poverty all their days. And those who 
have survived to old age, have found it 
often one long disease. All these have 
had “need of patience,” and would not 
have experienced its perfect work, if 
they had fainted in the day of adver- 
sity. I can never forget a Christian 
woman, eminent for spiritual joys, who 
was confined to her bed, with a wasting 
and at times excruciating disease, for 
about twenty years. Let not frivolous 
or superficial professors flatter them- 
3 


26 PATIENCE. 


selves that those fair-weather graces 
which they boast of now, will stand them 
in stead when long storms begin to howl. 
Unusual supports from the very hand 
of the Spirit are necessary, against such 
conjunctures; and which of us can be 
certain that such shall not befall him- 
self? 

Patience has a perfect work, when it 
grows to be an abiding habit of the soul. 
This cannot be, except by repeated acts 
of faith, submission and hope, reiterated 
till they are like a second nature. Such 
endurance rests on settled principle, 
and is an eminent work of the Holy 
Spirit. There are few more noble cha- 
racters we can give of any, than when 
we say of a believer, He is habitually 
patient. The character is rare, but we 
are invited to attain it. 

Whether the words of the apostle be 
considered asa command or an entreaty, 


PATIENCE. 27 


they equally imply that there was some | 
effort to be put forth. Let patience 
have her perfect work. “Place your- 
selves in the posture of being thoroughly 
and imperturbably constant even to the 
close of your mortal struggle.” This 
enjoins the forbearance of whatever is 
contrary to the meek and patient spirit, 
and the acquisition, preservation and 
increase of every good gift which is 
favourable to it; for instance, humility, 
sense of sin, godly sorrow and shame, 
thirst for holiness, faith, hope, courage, 
love and joy. Indeed patience has its 
perfect work, only where all sister 
graces are carried forward with sym- 
metrical increase; and whenever one 
of these is nourished into new strength, 
it contributes so much to the solid habit 
of Christian patience. 

III. Let us consider some of the mo- 
ties to let patience have her perfect 
work. 


28 PATIENCE. 


1. This is a virtue which is needed 
every day. Some excellencies of the 
soul are called out only by great emer- 
gencies, but the world in which we live 
is so beset with vexations that there is 
not a day, there is scarcely an hour, in 
which we are not called to be patient. 
The little events of domestic life, con- 
nected with ordinary labour and ser- 
vice, give the cumbered and troubled 
Martha as keen anguish as is felt by 
the general of an army or the ruler of 
a state, from defeats and revolutions. 
The inward grace required must not be 
measured by the apparent magnitude 
of the burden, but the strength of the 
sustainer. Spirits above perhaps look 
down on princes contending about the 
crown of an empire, with as much con- 
tempt as we bestow on infants fighting 
for a straw. But trials are not all 
equal. Sometimes, as we have seen, 


PATIENCE. 29 


vehement surges of affliction break in; 
and we know not on what day this 
may occur; hence we must be ready 
every day. All the days of our life we 
are going over one and the same course 
of Christian duty, viz., submitting our 
own selfish will to the will of God. 

2. Iherease of patience is increase of 
happiness. Though present happiness 
is not the great object of life, it is one 
of the effects of religion, to which we 
cannot be indifferent. And what is 
very remarkable, there is not a single 
religious act, which does not increase 
our happiness. Properly understood, 
the whole moral law, whether at Sinai 
or the mount of the Beatitudes, utters 
this one commandment, BE HAPPY! 
What is thus true of holiness in general 
is eminently true of this mode of it in 
particular. Pain almost ceases to be 
pain, to a mind that fully yields itself 


3 * 


30 PATIENCE. 


’ 


to God. That this is true in a much 
higher sense than ordinary Christians 
suppose, is apparent in the case of the 
martyrs; (Heb. xi. 52—49,) and we 
have known instances in common life 
where the most horrible maladies, al- 
most unmanning mere spectators, have 
been borne with equanimity and even 
cheerfulness, by disciples of Christ. 
Patience disarms affliction. If the pa- 
tience were perfect, the suffermg would 
be annihilated, as to its effect on hap- 
piness. The reason why true Christians 
sometimes endure great distresses before 
entire relief comes, 1s not that patience 
is an insufficient antidote, but that they 
have not patience enough. And here 
ubserve a striking difference between 
the stoical hardness of a worldly mind, 
and the sacred endowment which we 
are endeavouring to recommend. A stout 
hearted unbeliever will now and then 


go 
PATIENCE. 31 


appear absolutely unshrinking under 
trials, such as bodily pains, calumny, 
loss of children, hatred and enmity of 
fellow-creatures; but his shield is m- 
sensibility. He has made the surface 
callous. And in so doing he has stopped 
up the avenues as well of pleasure as 
of pain. He has diminished his sorrows 
without increasing his joys. Now ob- 
serve how opposite the case of Christ’s 
disciple. He suffers too, and triumphs 
in suffering, but not by insensibility. 
He feels the wound. The thrill of a 
poignant infliction runs through his 
quick and sentient nerve to the centre 
of feeling, as nimbly as in the most in- 
consolable and maddened unbeliever. 
He is not stupefied; he is not seared ; 
his temperament of genuine humanity 
is all alive to grief; but it is also alive 
to joy. And that joy God pours in, so 
that he glories in tribulation also. e- 


32 PATIENCE. 


ligion, which has made his susceptibili- 
ties more tender, opens new access for 
refined pleasures. For loss, he finds 
indemnity ; and for pain and woe, a 
spiritual. faith and hope, love and joy, 
which overcome and absorb them. 
Patience in such an advanced expe- 
rience 1s no longer unfeeling acquies- 
cence, but a swallowing up of man’s 
will in the will of God. What abun- 
dant reason have we, in this valley of 
tears and tombs, to strive that patience 
may have her perfect work ! 

3. Obedience to the requisition of the 
text conduces to true greatness of cha- 
racter. Religion, properly understood, 
is nothing else than a restitution begun, 
of humanity to its perfect condition. 

To be without religion is to be cur- 
tailed of the dimensions of man’s 
character. Every state of mind and 
heart which religion commands is just 


PATIENCE. 33 


so far a return to spiritual health. No 
human soul can be truly great while 
ignorant of God, alienated from God, 
opposed to God, slavishly in dread of 
God, and out of communion with God. 
Each grace of the Holy Spirit tends to 
lift man up towards the ideal of hu- 
manity. The trials of life bring all 
men into a certain conflict with ad- 
verse circumstances, producing pain. 
In this conflict many are conquered. 
But the Christian combatant finds every 
trial an occasion for bringing out latent 
reserves of a strength derived from 
Christ his Head. When he suffers 
therefore sharply and long, he is only 
like a soldier going from one battle to 
another, and waxing hardier and more 
courageous after each success. Hear 
how Paul, long tried in this athletic 
effort, expresses this Christian magna- 
nimity, (1 Cor. ix. 25,) “I therefore 


34 PATIENCE. 


run, not as uncertaily ; so fight I, not 
as one that beateth the air.” And 
“ Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold 
on eternal life.” There is reason to be- 
lieve, that no great Christian character 
can be developed without some severe 
discipline, that is, without patience, in 
its large and scriptural sense. 

4. Confirmed patience tends to use- 
Julness in the Church. The very 
reverse 1s often thought by the sufferer 
himself, especially if his trial throws 
him into solitude, poverty, contempt of 
brethren, weakness of body, pains of 
old age, or separation from friends. In 
the chamber of melancholy seclusion 
how many a soul has mourned that all 
opportunity of doing any thing for 
Christ was cut off. But this is a short- 
sighted and defective conclusion. When 
God’s infinitely wise and holy will is 
done, then the great end of our creation, 


PATIENCE. 35 


and our redemption, and our sanctifica- 
tion is accomplished, so far as we are 
concerned; whether it be by doing or 
by suffering. If it were possible for a 
perfectly sinless angel to be perpetually 
bathed in sorrow by the will of God, 
the pure spirit would accept the coming 
trial with a yielding bliss. And when 
the perfectly sinless Jesus, who was 
“very man, sank in griefs which sur- 
pass comprehension, he was accomplish- 
ing the purposes of the Godhead, and 
said, “‘ Not my will, but thine be done.” 
Now by sending trials and educing the 
grace of patience in repeated acts, God 
fits the soul for labours incalculably be- 
yond every thing it could have effected 
without this education. And _ these 
very pains, and the conduct of a be- 
hever under them, becoming visible to 
bystanders and fellow-servants, as well 
as to the ungodly themselves, go up as 


36 PATIENCE. 


a costly odour, to magnify the grace of 
the gospel. So that no sermons ever 
preached so loudly as the transient view 
of a suffering saint has sometimes done, 
when in the fiery heart of the hot fur- 
nace, he has been seen unhurt, with 
one like unto the Son of God. (Dan. 
ui. 25.) In both ways, therefore, by 
preparing for action, and by exhibiting 
the glory of grace, patience tends to 
benefit the Church. 

5. Finally. Putience when duly sus- 
tained leads to a great reward. Not in 
the sense of the Papists, who strike a 
commercial balance between pains and 
recompense, and set off so much trouble 
in this life against so much merited 
blessing in the life to come. But in 
perfect consistency with our belief that 
after all is done we are unprofitable 
servants, that all heavenly good is 
merited by our Saviour, and not by us, 


PATIENCE. 37 


and that a man may suffer pain here 
which shall be swallowed up in greater 
pains hereafter, we maintain and teach, 
that in the case of true believers, the 
gracious deportment of the soul under 
earthly affliction carries it forward to 
higher happiness than it would other- 
wise have reached. “For our light 
affliction, which is but for a moment, 
worketh for us a far more exceeding 
and eternal weight of glory.” By the 
work of God’s Spirit, the soul that suffers 
receives greater capacity for eventual 
joy. Whoso bears God’s burdens in a 
godly manner is made holier, and more 
fit and able to take in the surpassing 
blessedness of rest. And then our 
heavenly Father, who seeth not as man 
seeth, does not measure our obedience 
on a physical scale, by the amount and 
number of sensible acts, as if he reckoned 
up so many deeds outwardly done, so 


38 PATIENCE. 


many palpable effects produced, so many 
words spoken ; but by the quality of the 
inward affection and will, which may 
be heavenward and holy, and infinitely 
pleasing to God, in a poor creature 
locked in a dungeon, or motionless on 
a bed of illness. Where the soul pleases 
God, there the great work of life is ac- 
complished; in an apostolic discourse 
or miracle, in a gift of charity, in a 
resistance of temptation, or In agony on 
a CYoss. 

Patience, heavenly patience, under 
what God inflicts, is more pleasing to 
him than thousands of rams, and ten 
thousands of rivers of oil; which is of 
itself the all-comprehensive motive to 
pious submission and endurance. But 
what is pleasing to God, as the fruit of 
his Holy Spirit, God will graciously 
reward. “I know thy works,” saith 
he to Ephesus, “and thy labour and 


PATIENCE. 39 


thy patience.” “I know thy works,” 
saith he to Thyatira, “and charity, and 
service, and faith, and thy patience.” 
‘“ Because,” saith he to Philadelphia, 
“thou hast kept the word of my pa- 
tience, I also will keep thee.” “ Be- 
hold,” saith he to Smyrna, “the devil 
shall cast some of you into prison, that 
ye may be tried, and ye shall have tri- 
bulation ten days. Be thou faithful 
unto death, and I will give thee a crown 
of life!’ May I not add with renewed 
emphasis the exhortation of our apostle, 
though it struck strangely on the ear 
at first, “‘ My brethren, count it all joy, 
when ye fall into divers temptations ; 
knowing this that the trying of your 
faith worketh patience.” O my bro- 
ther—my sister—more patience will 
make us more like Christ. What are 
our sufferings to his! Meditate, step 
by step, on the degrees of his humilia- 


40 PATIENCE. 


tion, accompanying Him whom your 
souls love, from point to point of his 
unexampled sorrows; and thus will 
you find sin grow more intolerable, 
and suffering more light. 


THE END. 








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